Dear High School Seniors...
As a tour guide, I am continually asked about when I applied to Tufts. Naturally, I talk about why I choose Tufts and why I continue to enjoy my time here. But, I also often get questions from seniors or parents of seniors about the application questions. And because of that, I often find myself repeating the following advice: at this point, your grades are pretty much set in stone, your test scores are unlikely to change, but you CAN change how you are represented on a piece of paper.
Tufts will often tell you about the holistic approach they take when looking at an application. As a student who does not generally pride myself on my high school GPA, I can fully attest to this. The school and those reviewing your application want to see a full student, not just the one that can take tests perfectly, but isn’t able to articulate who they are, or how their environment has shaped their life, or why they want to attend this school. Keeping this in mind, my advice to you is to take this seriously. As a senior in high school, your life is already hectic enough, so take a load off by reminding yourself that missing that one extra question on your SAT isn’t going to kill your chance of getting into college. Back to my original point, you can still let Tufts in by illustrating who you are, so do that.
Honestly, Tufts was my ride-or-die school. I didn’t have a close second, so I was not sure what I would do if I was not accepted (maybe don’t take this advice, but you can’t always choose what you are drawn to). With this in mind, I threw myself into writing the best essays I could, so that when my admissions counselor looked at my application, my FULL application, they could see why I wanted to be here and how I would fit, not just how well I performed on a couple of tests.
So, step back, take a breather, stop worrying about those 20 points, and remember that there is still one thing you can change that will be seen, and that is how you represent yourself. Tufts’ holistic approach isn’t a joke, so why not take advantage of it?
Photo Credit: Jinx! (Flickr Creative Commons)